Arkady Strugatsky - Hard to Be a God

“You’re no fool, Don Reba,” the king said, thinking about it. “An investigation is a good thing. It can’t hurt. Damn that Irukanian—” He howled and grabbed his knee again. “Damn this leg! So after dinner, then? We’ll be waiting, we’ll be waiting.”

And the king, leaning on the shoulder of the Minister of Ceremonies, slowly walked toward the throne room past a stunned Rumata. As he entered the crowd of courtiers, which parted in front of him, Don Reba smiled amiably at Rumata and asked, “I believe you’re on duty tonight at the prince’s bedchamber? Am I not mistaken?”

Rumata silently bowed.

Rumata wandered aimlessly through the endless corridors and passages of the palace—dark, dank, and stinking of ammonia and decay. He walked past luxurious rooms decorated with rugs, past dusty studies with barred narrow windows, and past storerooms piled with junk stripped of gilding. There was almost no one here. Only the rare courtier would risk visiting this maze at the back of the palace, where the royal apartments imperceptibly became the offices of the Ministry of the Defense of the Crown. It was easy to get lost here. Everyone remembered the incident in which a patrol of the Guard, walking the perimeter of the palace, had been frightened by the heartrending wails of a man stretching his badly scratched arms through the bars of an embrasure. “Save me!” the man shouted. “I’m a gentleman of the bedchamber! I don’t know how to get out! I haven’t eaten for two days! Get me out of here!” (There was a lively ten-day correspondence between the Minister of Finances and the Minister of the Court, after which they did decide to break down the bars, but for the duration of these ten days the unfortunate gentleman of the bedchamber had been fed with meat and bread passed to him on the end of a pike.) Besides, it wasn’t entirely safe. In these tight corridors, you could meet drunk guardsmen who were protecting the king’s person, and drunk storm troopers who were protecting the ministry. These would fight tooth and nail, and when satisfied would go their separate ways, carrying away the wounded. Finally, the murdered also wandered here. Over two centuries, the palace had accumulated a lot of them.

A storm trooper on sentry duty stepped out from a deep recess in the wall, his ax at the ready. “You may not pass,” he declared sullenly.

“A lot you know, fool!” Rumata said carelessly, pushing him aside.

He heard the storm trooper stomping indecisively behind him and suddenly caught himself thinking that insulting words and careless gestures now came naturally to him, that he was no longer playing the role of a highborn boor but had largely become one. He imagined himself like this on Earth and felt disgusted and ashamed. Why? What has happened to me? Where did it go, my nurtured-since-childhood respect and trust in my own kind, in man—the amazing creature called man? Nothing can help me now, he thought in horror. Because I sincerely hate and despise them. Not pity them, no—only hate and despise. I can justify the stupidity and brutality of the kid I just passed all I want—the social conditions, the appalling upbringing, anything at all—but I now clearly see that he’s my enemy, the enemy of all that I love, the enemy of my friends, the enemy of what I hold most sacred. And I don’t hate him theoretically, as a “typical specimen,” but him as himself, him as an individual. I hate his slobbering mug, the stink of his unwashed body, his blind faith, his animosity toward everything other than sex and booze. There he goes, stomping around, the oaf, who half a year ago was still being thrashed by a fat-bellied father in a vain attempt to prepare him for selling stale flour and old jam; he’s wheezing, the dumb lug, struggling to recall the paragraphs of badly crammed regulations, and he just can’t figure out whether he’s supposed to cut the noble don down with his ax, shout “Stop!” or just forget about it. No one will find out anyway, so he’ll forget about it, go back to his recess, stuff some chewing bark into his mouth and chew it loudly, drooling and smacking his lips. And there’s nothing that he wants to know, and there’s nothing he wants to think about. Think! And is our eagle Don Reba any better? Yes, of course, his psychology is more intricate and his reflexes are more complicated, but his thoughts are like these palace mazes, reeking of ammonia and crime, and he himself is just foul beyond expression—a dreadful criminal and shameless spider. I came here to love people, to help them unbend, see the sky. No, I’m a bad operative, he thought remorsefully. I’m a no-good historian. When exactly did I manage to fall into the swamp that Don Condor was talking about? Does a god have the right to feel anything other than pity?

He heard a hurried clomp-clomp-clomp of boots along the corridor behind him. Rumata turned around and crossed his arms, placing his hands on the hilts of his swords. He saw Don Ripat running toward him, holding on to the blade at his side. “Don Rumata! Don Rumata!” he cried from afar in a hoarse whisper. Rumata let go of his swords. When he got close, Don Ripat took a look around and in a barely audible voice said in his ear, “I’ve been looking for you for an entire hour. Waga the Wheel is in the palace! He’s having a conversation with Don Reba in the lilac quarters.”

Rumata even squeezed his eyes shut for a second. Then, cautiously moving away, he said with polite surprise, “You mean the famous robber? But he’s either been executed or was invented to begin with.”

The lieutenant licked his dry lips. “He’s real. He’s in the palace. I thought you’d like to know.”

“My dearest Don Ripat,” Rumata said impressively, “I’m interested in rumors. Gossip. Jokes. Life can be so boring… You have clearly misunderstood me.” The lieutenant looked at him with wild eyes. “Judge for yourself,” Rumata went on. “Why should I care about the unsavory relationships of Don Reba—who, however, I respect too much to presume to judge? Besides, I apologize, I’m in a hurry. There’s a lady waiting for me.”

Don Ripat licked his lips again, gave an awkward bow, and sidled away.

Rumata was suddenly struck by a happy thought. “By the way, my friend,” he called out amiably, “how did you like the little intrigue that Don Reba and I carried out this morning?”

Don Ripat stopped eagerly. “We are very pleased,” he said.

“It was very charming, don’t you think?”

“It was magnificent! The gray officers are very glad that you have finally openly taken our side. You’re such an intelligent man, Don Rumata, and yet you consort with barons, with noble bastards—”

“My dear Ripat!” Rumata said haughtily, turning to walk away. “You forget that from the height of my birth I see absolutely no difference even between the king and yourself. Good-bye.”

He strode through the corridors, making confident turns and silently pushing sentries aside. He wasn’t sure what he was going to do, but he realized that this was a piece of astonishing, rare luck. He had to listen to the conversation between the two spiders. No wonder Don Reba had asked fourteen times as much for Waga alive than for Waga dead.

Two gray lieutenants, their blades drawn, stepped out toward him from the lilac curtains.

“Hello, friends,” Don Rumata said, stopping between them. “Is the minister here?”

“The minister is busy, Don Rumata,” said one of the lieutenants.

“I’ll wait,” Rumata said. He passed through the curtains.

It was pitch black. Rumata groped his way between the chairs, tables, and iron lamp stands. A number of times he distinctly heard someone huffing by his ear and was enveloped in a rich odor of garlic and beer. Then he saw a faint streak of light, heard honorable Waga’s familiar tenor, and stopped. At that instant, the end of a spear gently poked him between the shoulder blades. “Quiet, blockhead,” he said irritably but softly. “It’s me, Don Rumata.” The spear was removed. Rumata dragged a chair toward the streak of light, sat down, stretching his legs, and yawned loudly enough to be heard. Then he began to watch.